Slopaganda

The internet is ruined. Ruined I tell you!

It was ruined when you chose proprietary messengers over open protocols.

It was ruined when you let Google search and Chrome become gatekeeper to the web whilst they sold your privacy as a service.

It was ruined when brands engaged and you hit the like button.

It was ruined when you uploaded your life to Facebook and FOMO’d your friends and family into doing the same.

It was ruined when Reddit became a sockpuppet convention and you upvoted.

It was ruined when Apple restricted your access for their own profit whilst you styled your life around luxury e-waste that can’t hold a charge past midday.

It was ruined when Netflix and Spotify replaced your content ownership rights with rentals and you subscribed en masse.

It was ruined when blockchain bros sold intangible memes and you bought them.

It was ruined when you starting sending information beyond the Discord event horizon.

It was ruined when you repeatedly clicked the next gurning baboon on YouTube.

I daren’t even speak of what you’re doing offline to ruin it.

Sloppery slope

The internet is now being ruined by “Artificial ‘Intelligence’” and half of you are practically suckling at the exhaust end of slop factories. Everything that previously ruined the internet is now being regurgitated for a second serving.

Personally, I’ve engaged in none of this. And even if I did, which I didn’t, hypocrisy doesn’t make me wrong, merely an expert in the matter. I’ve seen the internet from the beginning. I’ve watched the continuous beating it’s been given.

Well done, you’ve ruined it.

The internet may be ruined for now but it can recover. It’s shown remarkable resilience but we can’t take it for granted. I have some advice, if you’re done ruining it?

Here’s my advice

The web is where most internet discourse happens and evidently you’re doing it wrong. Remember that apps are not the web. Uninstall that spyware and use a web browser.

On the web there’s a better place to express yourself than in a comments section. I’ll get to that in a minute. If you absolutely must comment do us a favour and keep it short. Stick to around 200 characters, or 50 words, or one paragraph. Don’t get hung up on exact numbers you know what I mean. Nobody reads longer comments.

More to the point, your comment is enabling the very platforms that ruined the internet. Yeah I get it, someone was wrong, you have an original joke, whatever. Keep it short.

And put your LLM away, no one wants to see that.

This does not mean you can’t write an essay online.

What I’m saying is don’t comment it. At least not all of it. Publish it on your own website; POSSE. Take control and make a website that is yours and yours alone. Don’t be another NPC, have some agency. Poision the well. Reject the über theme. They’ll churn your content into slop eventually but don’t feed it to them directly, make them steal it.

The internet was ruined but your little corner doesn’t have to be. From there you can survive slopageddon. Own your intellect and share it with others who do likewise. Maybe even link to it in the comments. They don’t like you linking? Let them drown in their slopaganda.

P.S. you don’t need to apologise for your favourite billion dollar tech company. They employ PR and legal departments. Don’t do it for free.

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